As medical device technologies continue to evolve, active implanted medical devices have gained increasing popularity in the medical field. For example, one type of implanted medical device includes neurostimulator devices, which are battery-powered or battery-less devices that are designed to deliver electrical stimulation to a patient. Through proper electrical stimulation, the neurostimulator devices can provide pain relief for patients or restore bodily functions.
Implanted medical devices (for example a neurostimulator) can be controlled using an electronic programming device such as a clinician programmer or a patient programmer. These programmers can be used by medical personnel or the patient to define the particular electrical stimulation therapy to be delivered to a target area of the patient's body, alter one or more parameters of the electrical stimulation therapy, or otherwise conduct communications with a patient. Advances in the medical device field have improved these electronic programmers. For example, some existing programmers allow the creation and display of pain maps and stimulation maps as part of the pain diagnosis and communication with the patient. However, the pain and stimulation maps on existing programmers have certain shortcomings. Among other things, these shortcomings include frequently limitation to two-dimensional displays, imprecise definitions of the pain regions, lack of navigational versatility and flexibility, etc. And to the extent that certain programmers may offer 3D-like displays, these displays are data-intensive and are not conducive for sharing with a remote device, for example another programmer or an external display or remote monitor, such as the secondary display disclosed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/600,875, filed on Aug. 31, 2012, entitled “Clinician Programming System And Method”, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
Therefore, although existing methods and mechanisms for creating and displaying pain maps and stimulation maps have been generally adequate for their intended purposes, they have not been entirely satisfactory in every aspect.